Latest About Talula’s Daily

Maybe you’re a freelancer with a few hours between meetings downtown and you want to keep up the productivity. Or there’s construction in your office building and you can’t get anything done with power tools grinding away upstairs. Or you work from home but you’ve reached the point at which you’ll freak out if you don’t leave the house today.

You need a spot to get work done — school, freelance, creative, or just catching up on email. You also need to eat, and as tasty as the croissants and cookies at most coffee shops are, they’re not exactly brain food.

We’ve rounded up some of Philly’s favorite spots to camp out for a few hours (or more), eat a real breakfast or lunch, crush your task list. For our purposes, we’ve stuck with Center City and adjacent neighborhoods; we also made free wi-fi for customers and an actual food menu (however brief) a requirement.

And for when the workday spans meals, we’ve compiled a few of our favorite trendy spots where you might spend a working lunch (and maybe happy hour afterwards) while chowing down on a more substantial, chef-driven menu.

On Monday, November November 30th, Aimee Olexy and Talula’s Daily are hosting chef Justin Smillie of the acclaimed Upland in New York. It’s a night of Starr Restaurants synergy (Upland is a Starr restaurant) as Smillie will be celebrating his new cookbook, Slow Fires during the $100 per person dinner. The book explores the fundamentals of braising, roasting and grilling as well as how to break those rules.

Diners will have a chance to chat with Smillie after he cooks dishes from his book. The dinner begins at 7 p.m. and a wine pairing will be available for an additional $60. Pick up a signed copy of Slow Fires for $40 at the event.

If there are two words to get me off the couch and out of my blissfully air-conditioned bedroom, they are “free” and “food.” And I can’t be the only one. Luckily, if you’re a Yelp user there are all sorts of pick-me-ups to be had around the city. And all you have to do to get them is “Check In” on Yelp at any of the establishments below to snag your freebie.